Joe Pavelski Sparks the Sharks, Whether He’s on the Ice or Not

The stakes are huge for Pavelski, and now not simply at the ice, the place he’s decided to ship San Jose’s first N.H.L. championship. Ask the group’s tv analyst, Jamie Baker, who reviews at the sport from ice degree. Baker, 52, a retired heart, stepped clear of his broadcasting tasks closing yr to hunt remedy for melancholy, impulsivity and suicidal ideas, all of which he stated had plagued him for years. Baker stated that he had sustained a number of concussions all over his enjoying profession, which incorporated 187 video games with the Sharks, and that they perceived to have exacerbated his mental-health struggles.

Any uneasiness that Baker felt about Pavelski’s fast go back from his head damage evaporated within the first length of Pavelski’s first sport, when he used to be knocked to the ice via the Avalanche’s Ian Cole, who used to be known as for interference.

“He were given thrown down lovely onerous,” Baker stated. “I watched him getting up, I actually were given to peer his face, and I may inform he used to be O.Ok. That’s the take a look at, since the something you’re now not going via in follow is the extraordinary tempo of an N.H.L. sport and the physicality.”

After Saturday’s sport, a towering tattooed guy — dressed in a bejeweled ring that drew the attention clear of his frame artwork — stood out of doors the Sharks’ dressing room looking ahead to Pavelski. He used to be Scott Parker, a member of the 2001 Stanley Cup-champion Colorado Avalanche, who seemed in 11 video games for the Sharks in 2006-07, Pavelski’s rookie season.

In a 2013 interview with The Denver Publish, Parker described experiencing momentary reminiscence loss, sensitivity to mild, nausea and dizziness — all signs which have been related to repeated head trauma.

However Parker, 41, stated he used to be happy to peer Pavelski again at the ice.